peculiarity respecting alcohol when it is separated by an animal
membrane from a watery fluid like the blood, that it will not pass
through the membrane until it has become charged, to a given point of
dilution, with water. It is itself, in fact, _so greedy for water, it
will pick it up from watery textures, and deprive them of it until, by
its saturation, its power of reception is exhausted_, after which it
will diffuse into the current of circulating fluid."

It is this power of absorbing water from every texture with which
alcoholic spirits comes in contact, that creates the burning thirst of
those who freely indulge in its use. Its effect, when it reaches the
circulation, is thus described by Dr. Richardson:

"As it passes through the circulation of the lungs it is exposed to the
air, and some little of it, raised into vapor by the natural heat, is
thrown off in expiration. If the quantity of it be large, this loss may
be considerable, and the odor of the spirit may be detected in the
expired breath. If the quantity be small, the loss will be comparatively
little, as the spirit will be held in solution by the water in the
blood. After it has passed through the lungs, and has been driven by the
left heart over the arterial circuit, it passes into what is called the
minute circulation, or the structural circulation of the organism. The
arteries here extend into very small vessels, which are called
arterioles, and from these infinitely small vessels spring the equally
minute radicals or roots of the veins, which are ultimately to become
the great rivers bearing the blood back to the heart. In its passage
through this minute circulation the alcohol finds its way to every
organ. To this brain, to these muscles, to these secreting or excreting
organs, nay, even into this bony structure itself, it moves with the
blood. In some of these parts which are not excreting, it remains for a